Preparing For Your Spring Garage Sale

While you’re cleaning out your garage as part of your spring cleaning, you’re likely to find a lot of items that you no longer want. Whether you currently have a custom garage installed or are still in the thinking-about-it phase, cleaning out your garage at least yearly makes good sense. First of all, you’ll be purging items that you rarely, if ever, use, and secondly, you can make some money, either directly by selling the unused items, or indirectly by donating them and writing their value off of your taxes next year.

If you have opted to have a garage sale, here are some great tips to keep in mind:

• As you put items aside to include in your sale, make sure that they’re in clean, working condition.

  Clothes should be recently laundered and either folded or hung during the sale; try washing them over the course of the week before the sale if they’ve been in storage for a while, then folding and stacking or hanging in your garage. Have batteries on hand to test any battery-operated electronics. Dust off books, knickknacks and other small items. In short, get them in the condition that you’d want them in if you were the one buying.

• Make sure that you have the materials that you need before the big day.

  Borrow folding tables if you don’t already have enough. Have a lot of small bills and coins on hand for making change. Buy price stickers and apply them as you put the items in the “to sell” pile; if you haven’t been doing this, do it a day or two ahead of time instead of waiting until the morning of the sale.

• Advertise!

  It’s up to you if you want to take out an ad in the newspaper. You could advertise on Craigslist for free, and you can also put up signs on telephone poles the morning of your sale. Be sure to go back and gather them all up at the end of the day!

• Clearly delineate which things are for sale and which are not.

  If you are having the sale in your garage, cover the items that you’re not selling with tarps or sheets. Another option is to put all of the items that you are selling toward the front of the garage, or even in the driveway if the weather is clear. If you aren’t the only person handling the sale of items, make sure that everyone is aware of which items aren’t for sale. This will greatly reduce the possibility that a bin of needed items will get sold for a few dollars!

• Have a plan for the items that don’t sell.

  Decide whether you’re going to be throwing them away or donating them to charity. Don’t make the mistake of saving your unwanted items; remember that you wanted to get rid of them in the first place! Putting them back in your home or garage is a surefire way to start building up more clutter that you don’t want hanging around your living and storage areas. Either call your local thrift shop or charity, or stick the items in front of the house marked “free,” knowing that they’ll be carted away on the next garbage day.

Holding a garage sale is a great way to declutter and make a few dollars in the process. One man’s trash is another man’s treasure, after all!